Capcom Captivate 2012: RE 6, SF X Tekken, DmC and Lost Planet 3

Capcom’s annual Captivate event always provides a good picture of what to expect from the company for the following 12 months.

The important things to take away from Captivate 2012 are as follows: Lost Planet 3 is coming, Albert Wesker has a son, Street Figther X Tekken on PS Vita should match the quality of the PS3 version and Dante is a “sexual deviant”. That’s right.

It should be a solid year.

Lost Planet 3

Capcom announced Lost Planet 3 with a sparkling CG trailer featuring Jim, “a rig pilot who leaves Earth to take on a hazardous but lucrative contract on E.D.N. III”. The trailer shows Jim running hopelessly from a tentacular alien across an icy plain, before calling out a giant mech suit to scare it off before pummeling its big mate. Then there’s an ice storm.

The trailer doesn’t offer explicit details on how the gameplay will work out; however, expect survival (from the aliens and elements ) to play a big part, as will big set pieces and bigger aliens. Those big mech suits should also feature regularly. No point wasting Jim’s rig piloting skills. Eh?

Lost Planet 2 arrived on PS3 to a lukewarm reception in 2010. That was developed in-house at Capcom using the company’s propriety MT Framework 2.0 engine. Development for Lost Planet 3 however is now in the hands of US studio Spark Unlimited (Turning Point, Legendary and Call of Duty: Finest Hour) and the game is running on Unreal 3. It is therefore difficult to guess how this will go.

The studio doesn’t have the best track record but Capcom’s producer Andrew Szymanski has downplayed concerns in an interview with Eurogamer.

“For people who wonder why we made that choice, it’s certainly important to look at a track record and what people have done in the past, but that can’t tell you the whole story,

“Particularly when it comes to a collaborative effort – what we found is they’ve got the technical ability and the passion and the drive. I don’t think Spark alone or Capcom alone could have created this – it had to be a collaborative effort.”

Let’s see some gameplay before passing judgement. Lost Planet 2 after all was a game that felt like it should have been more enjoyable than it was. Maybe the time is right for Spark to come good and help the series to reach its potential.

Resident Evil 6

Captivate also offered a lengthy trailer and more details for Resident Evil 6. The C-Virus outbreak has spread worldwide, taking the action to North America, Eastern Europe and China.

The game will feature three playable characters – Leon, Chris and Jake Muller (he’s new to the series) – and each will have their own unique play style.

Zombies are more intelligent these days, capable of jumping and even using weapons. More threatening sounding though are the J’avo, a new breed of infected undead fodder, capable of regenerating and even mutating depending on how they take damage.

Just because “known sexual deviant” Dante (yep) has had a western makeover, it doesn’t mean he’s forgotten how to fight. That at least is the promising signs we can gather from the new DmC trailer.

The sight of Dante elegantly combining pistol and sword techniques will please existing fans, as will the fluidity of it all. Will the trippy, sordid and loud world please? That’s a question only you can tell us. Let us know below.

Street Fighter X Tekken

Street Fighter X Tekken arriving on PS Vita later this year will allow you to experience the ultimate fighting game crossover anywhere you desire. Capcom has so much faith in its portable version that the studio is allowing cross-platform play, meaning you can tackle PS3 players using your PS Vita.

The PS Vita version will also come with 12 additional players, who can transfer over to the PS3 version if you own both. Those fighters are Dudley and Elena; Christie and Lei; Sakura and Blanka; Lars and Alisa; Brian Fury and Jack X, and Guy and Cody. See them in action in the video above.